Senior Engineering Manager, Retailer Discovery Experience

We're transforming the grocery industry

At Instacart, we invite the world to share love through food because we believe everyone should have access to the food they love and more time to enjoy it together. Where others see a simple need for grocery delivery, we see exciting complexity and endless opportunity to serve the varied needs of our community. We work to deliver an essential service that customers rely on to get their groceries and household goods, while also offering safe and flexible earnings opportunities to Instacart Personal Shoppers.

Instacart has become a lifeline for millions of people, and we’re building the team to help push our shopping cart forward. If you’re ready to do the best work of your life, come join our table.

Instacart is a Flex First team

There’s no one-size fits all approach to how we do our best work. Our employees have the flexibility to choose where they do their best work—whether it’s from home, an office, or your favorite coffee shop—while staying connected and building community through regular in-person events. Learn more about our flexible approach to where we work.

Overview

About the Role - As the Senior Engineering Manager for the Retailer Discovery Experience team, you’ll be at the forefront of enabling customers to discover, explore, and shop across thousands of retailers seamlessly. This team powers critical, high-impact surfaces like Home, Cross Retailer Search, and the Store Directory—all pivotal entry points for Instacart’s users. Your leadership will shape not just the team’s growth but also key aspects of the Instacart user journey, contributing to enhanced affordability, retention, and marketplace growth.

You will guide your team in delivering innovative, scalable, and reliable systems that fuel affordability improvements, drive retailer discovery, and create seamless multi-retailer shopping experiences. From crafting a technical vision to ensuring engineering excellence, your work will impact millions of users and usher in the next chapter of Instacart's growth.

 

About the Team - The Retailer Discovery Experience team sits within the Shopping Org in core Instacart App org (Online Grocery) and serves as the backbone of Instacart’s commitment to connecting users across a growing network of retailers. This high-performing, feature-oriented, and business-critical team excels in delivering projects that directly shape Instacart’s affordability, user satisfaction, and product visibility goals.

• Team Size & Structure: Currently comprising 8 engineers, the team will grow to 12 in the coming months, with a healthy mix of junior and senior talent. You’ll lead a rapidly scaling team that thrives on cross-collaboration and high visibility.
• Key Achievements: Successfully improved retention through affordability initiatives, streamlined app navigation for seasonal and restaurant use cases, and expanded categories outside of grocery.

As a leader of this team, you’ll work with talented engineers, standout PMs, and cross-functional collaborators to continue to raise the bar for innovation and execution at Instacart.

 

About the Job

In this role, you will lead a growing team, own highly visible business-critical surfaces, and partner with key stakeholders to advance major product and engineering goals. Responsibilities will include:

• Leadership & Strategy:
• Define and communicate the team’s technical strategy in alignment with company-wide product objectives.
• Drive the vision for long-term architectural investments and execution excellence.
• Create high-impact roadmaps for systems that optimize for scalability, performance, and user experience.
• Engineering Excellence:
• Guide engineers in adopting best practices for design, development, and scalability.
• Ensure delivery of high-quality systems with clear expectations on metrics like latency, incidents, reliability, and product polish.
• Partner with cross-functional leaders (PM, ML, DS) to manage time-sensitive business needs and execute innovative projects.
• Team Development:
• Champion a strong team culture, where engineers take pride in their work and find growth opportunities.
• Manage team health, performance, and career development through 1:1 coaching, feedback, and mentorship.
• Lead hiring to grow an inclusive, high-performing team aligned with Instacart’s goals.
• Partnership & Collaboration:
• Foster cross-team alignment by building relation